Mary Barton is beautiful but has been born poor. Her father fights for the rights of his fellow workers, but Mary wants to make a better life for them both. She decides to reject her lover Jem in the hope of marrying rich mill-owner's son Henry Carson. She soon finds herself hopelessly torn between them.

Mary Barton (Collins Classics)

elizabeth-gaskell

HarperCollins, Publishers

"Cranford" depicts the lives and preoccupations of the inhabitants of a small village - their petty snobberies and appetite for gossip, and their loyal support for each other in times of need. The village is dominated by women, from the kindly spinster Miss Matty, living in genteel poverty with her redoubtable sister, to Lady Glenmire, who shocks everyone by marrying the doctor. When men do appear, such as 'modern' Captain Brown or Matty's suitor from the past, they bring disruption and excitement to the everyday life of Cranford. This volume includes the novella "Cousin Phillis", which depicts a fleeting love affair in a rural community at a time when old values are being supplanted by the new. Both works are exquisitely observed tragicomedies of human nature, told with great delicacy and affection.

Cranford / Cousin Phillis (Penguin Classics)

Literature & Fiction

British & Irish

Penguin Classics

Gaskell's witty and poignant comedy of country town life  A gently comic picture of life in an English country town in the mid-nineteenth century, "Cranford" describes the small adventures of Miss Matty and Miss Deborah, two middle- aged spinster sisters striving to live with dignity in reduced circumstances. Rich with humor and filled with vividly memorable characters -- including the dignified Lady Glenmire and the duplicitous showman Signor Brunoni -- "Cranford" is a portrait of kindness, compassion, and hope.

Cranford (Penguin Popular Classics)

PENGUIN POPULAR CLASSICS

John Barton blames the death of his wife on her beautiful, impulsive sister, Esther. Before mysteriously vanishing, Esther vows to make a lady of her niece, Mary; words which sow the seeds of ambition within the young girl.

Mary Barton

Penguin Audio

Traces the life of Molly Gibson from childhood to adulthood and depicts life in a nineteenth century provincial English town.

Wives and Daughters (Penguin Classics)

United States

Six stories deal with a rural British community, local legends, the supernatural, and intolerance

My Lady Ludlow and Other Stories (The ^AWorld's Classics)

Oxford University Press

The Life of Charlotte Bronte, Vol. 1 of 2: Author of "Jane Eyre," "Shirley," "Villette," &C (Classic Reprint)

Biographies & Memoirs

Forgotten Books

The Life of Charlotte Brontë

Franklin Classics Trade Press

A revolutionary social and political commentary, North and South solidified Gaskell’s place in the company of Victorian England’s finest novelists. This Norton Critical Edition of her best-selling novel is annotated and edited by preeminent Gaskell scholar Alan Shelston. "Contexts" includes contemporary reviews and correspondence related to North and South, along with the full text of Gaskell’s 1850 short story "Lizzie Leigh," which, like North and South, is set in industrial Manchester and deals with strong working women. This topic is further addressed in Bessie Rayner Parkes’s essay on Victorian working women. "Criticism" collects eleven assessments of the novel, among them Louis Cazamian’s 1904 study of industrial fiction and Hilary Schor’s recent study of North and South in the context of discourse analysis. A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included.

North and South: A Norton Critical Edition (Norton Critical Editions)

W.W.Norton&Company

Molly seems fated to suffer, firstly from her father's ill-conceived remarriage, and then from seeing her friend Roger Hamley infatuated with Molly's stepsister Cynthia. Everyone relies on Molly, but when will she have a fulfilling life of her own? This study edition contains commentary.

Wives and Daughters: An Every-Day Story (Everyman's Library)

Literary

Everyman

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